At first glance, imposter syndrome could be describing being thrown in at the deep end, learning to swim. But in the talent pool, this can be a crippling fear holding many back from leading full careers.
A fraud. A persistent internal voice, dragging at confidence. I must be rubbish.
Imposter syndrome. Is it holding back bright people from realising their potential? Or is it yet another label forcing action back on individuals, and disproportionately women, rather than the industry itself?
Aimee Buchanan, CEO of GroupM in AUNZ: “The first time I stepped into a client leadership role, I’d worked on the business for six years, and I was still freaking out.
“As CEO, I was beside myself with anxiety for a few months. I had a five or six month old baby and was thinking ‘I’m barely getting dressed every day. How can I run a company?’”
Buchanan says people get confidence by succeeding and when you haven’t succeeded in a role, it gives cause to question ability.
“There’s a lot outside of your control in these agency leadership roles, where you’re desperately trying to keep all the pieces moving,” she says.
“It’s kind of like Whac-A-Mole (the arcade game). You rarely get a day when everything is going perfect. So it does cause quite a bit of self doubt.”
Buchanan surrounds herself with people who have confidence, who mesh well.
“And I do think that the more senior you get, you have to internalise a lot of that doubt, because people don’t want to look up and see someone in a panic,” she says.
“You need the people that you can confide in ... the people that you can call upon that give you that moment of clarity or just a quiet corner sometimes to go sit in and rock in.
“For many women, it’s accentuated in terms of the self doubt holding them back and preventing them from maybe taking that leap.
“I had a lovely client who, at one point in my career, I was talking to about what my next move would be.
“He said: ‘Ames, you’re crazy. You are so ready to do that.’ His comment was that a lot of women need to be 70% to 80% ready to make the move. Whereas in his eyes, for men it was perhaps 50% ready. ‘Have a bit of faith and back yourself,’ he said.
“It was a good insight. I had been thinking: I haven’t got that skill and haven’t got that skill. And he’s telling me I’ve got them all and, yes, I have some growth ahead.
